But for a moment opposite your grate
To stand, without great wrong to any one,
You might pass for him, and do me great kindness.
Or the good Father there, if he be willing
To doff his cowl and turn him to the light,
He hath a good thick beard, and a stern eye,
That would be better still.
RAYNER (laughing).
(Laughing again more violently than at first.)
MARDONIO (turning out the Turnkey in a passion, and returning sternly to Rayner).
This lightness of the soul, strange and unsuited
To thy unhappy state? it shocks me much.
Approaching death brings naught to scare the good,
Yet has it wherewithal to awe the boldest:
And there are seasons when the lighted soul
Is call'd on to look inward on itself
In awful seriousness.
RAYNER.
I laugh'd, but, faith! I am not light of soul:
And he who most misfortune's scourge hath felt
Will tell thee laughter is the child of mis'ry.
Ere sin brought wretchedness into the world,
The soberness of undisturbed bliss
